Friday, October 25, 2013

Power of Shazam#18, prelim to finished cover

Here's another preliminary drawing I did, before the painting stage on Power of Shazam#18. I worked out detail, and composition, and also set my perspective on tracing paper (vellum) at same size as the cover art (11 x17"). I used a lightbox to transfer this image in pencil, to a sheet of 2 ply Strathmore bristol board, and then applied the watercolor paint to the clean board.

I wanted a warm feel, with sunlight coming through the window, but still wanted it to read "hospital room" with the green radiator. With watercolors on large areas, you have to work fast, and apply color uniformly. That's always a challenge, but with the board taped down to keep it from wrinkling, I apply water to the entire area I want to lay a specific color to, and this helps with drying time, so you can swab paint down into damp paper.
At this stage, I am pretty sure I hadn't had a clear visual on the menace whose hands are coming for Mary Marvel, except that he'd have been horribly scarred. Peter Krause was drawing the comic's interiors from my scripts, and I believe he actually designed the villain.
Anyhow, the only other thing to add, is that I used a photo of my wife in this pose, to capture the lighting more realistically. I don't do this very often, but it helps when you want a realistic effect. I think in this case, it made for a more dramatic cover.

Power of Shazam, and all related characters are trademark and copyright 2013 by DC Entertainment, and used here for educational purposes.